Heartbroken….

30. October 2010 · Comments Off on Heartbroken…. · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

Jacob and Timmy wore their Halloween costumes to school today. It turns out Jacob and another classmate both happened to have “Luigi” costumes. In fact, I got a picture of the two of them!

From 2010 10 29 Timmy Jacob Halloween Parade 2010

The boys had a good time with their Halloween parade at school, and their respective Halloween parties. But after school Jacob asked if he could wear another costume to go trick or treating…his classmates told him he didn’t really look like Luigi as well as the other young man in the picture.

Jacob also claimed that he never really wanted to be Luigi, but that simply wasn’t true. The boys were super excited all month at how easy it would be for Jacob to be Luigi because he was tall and skinny, and Timmy would be Mario because Mario is shorter and less-skinny. It was also evident the first two times he wore the costume, he was having a great time.

At first I was ready to just run to the store and buy Jacob a polyester unitard of his choice…I guess Jacob’s getting to the age where individuality is going to be trumped by popularity. He’s getting older, and I think I’ve been lucky that he’s rarely expressed strong opinions in what he wore up till recently. I think he’d have felt better in the store bought version of the costume.

In general, I’m still heartbroken. I may just have to absolutely turn Jacob loose with the choice/shopping/assembly of his costumes from now on…with zero input from me.

Sniff…sniff…my babies are growing up…

Gettin’ in the Halloween Spirit

25. October 2010 · Comments Off on Gettin’ in the Halloween Spirit · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

This weekend we finally took some time to get into the Halloween spirit. Friday we went to the Bellevue Pumpkin Patch to choose the family pumpkins, then the boys had a chance to wear their Halloween costumes both Saturday and Sunday.

First of all, if you like this picture below, then click the link here to vote for them in a Fox Sports contest to have this picture shown during Game 3 of the World Series. No silly login/password/consent for spam required. The voting button is towards the right of the page.

From 2010 10 31 Halloween 2010

The Bellevue Berry Farm and Pumpkin Patch is right up the road from us. We usually pay a visit to the much-larger Vala’s Pumpkin Patch at some point, but always get so caught up in the attractions, we never make it out to get our pumpkins. Bellevue is so much more relaxing and laid back, we have an equally good time. Living only 10 minutes from there definitely helps too.

We met Timmy’s friend Roger’s family out there and had a fun morning.

From 2010 10 22 Bellevue Pumpkin Patch
From 2010 10 22 Bellevue Pumpkin Patch
From 2010 10 22 Bellevue Pumpkin Patch
From 2010 10 22 Bellevue Pumpkin Patch
From 2010 10 22 Bellevue Pumpkin Patch
From 2010 10 22 Bellevue Pumpkin Patch

Saturday was the AFWA Halloween party.  For those new to my blog, AFWA stands for Air Force Weather Agency, and it’s the name of the military organization Dave works for.  Their Halloween party consists of games and crafts for the kids, hot dogs and cupcakes, and then it’s wrapped up by a “Trunk or Treat”.

Last year we simply took the boys and they had a good time, but this time we did a bit more. I put on my recently-renovated witch costume and decorated our trunk up pretty fun. I got a bit overzealous thinking our car battery could power our fog machine, oops 🙂

From 2010 10 31 Halloween 2010
From 2010 10 31 Halloween 2010
From 2010 10 31 Halloween 2010
From 2010 10 31 Halloween 2010
From 2010 10 31 Halloween 2010
From 2010 10 31 Halloween 2010

Today we made our way to the Omaha Zoo’s “Spooktacular” event. Apparently this is a pretty big deal around here. Perhaps it’s worth its own “Nebraska Discoveries” blog post because it was a cultural attraction all in itself! Yes, I think that’s what I’ll do.

Project Halloween Costume 2010: Complete!

20. October 2010 · Comments Off on Project Halloween Costume 2010: Complete! · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: ,

I’ll have pictures of the costumes later this week, the kids have the 1st of 4 Halloween events this Saturday!

The 2nd set of overalls were much more difficult mostly due to a finicky bobbin and a sewing machine that desperately needs a tune up.  I switched to a red-threaded bobbin out of frustration and suddenly everything went much better.  Sure, hints of red underside thread everywhere, but they’re Mario’s overalls, I’m sure it’ll be okay.

Tonight the boys and I stopped at Nobbie’s, the local Halloween shop, and picked up 8 stick-on black mustaches.  This should be interesting, especially with Timmy’s not-so-dark head of hair, ha ha!

As for me, I’ll break out my witch costume from last year, but I’ll be making some edits to it.

What’s That? A Hat!!!*

16. October 2010 · Comments Off on What’s That? A Hat!!!* · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

*Wondering where the title comes from?

So here’s my hat trick for the boys’ Halloween costumes.  We were fortunate to have a green ball cap in the house (from when Dave was on the crew of the New Hope Valley RR in North Carolina) and we have several red NC State ballcaps, so it was 50 cents at Michael’s to pick up some felt and make new fronts.

No, they aren’t perfect.  And no, they aren’t the same floppy plumbers hats that the animated characters have.  But for 50 cents for both hats…and the ability to bring the hats back to its original form by pulling the thread holding it in place…this will work well.  Besides, these are adult ball caps, they’re pretty roomy on my boys’ heads.

Before:

From 2010 10 16 Halloween Mario & Luigi Costumes

After:

From 2010 10 16 Halloween Mario & Luigi Costumes

And here’s Luigi:

From 2010 10 16 Halloween Mario & Luigi Costumes

I hope to have the 2nd pair of overalls finished by the end of this weekend.  Then the only thing left will be the mustaches, which I haven’t figured out quite yet.  The boys have two Halloween events next weekend.

Volunteerism

15. October 2010 · Comments Off on Volunteerism · Categories: gardening

Today I’m going to talk to you about “volunteers”.

“Oooo…what kind of volunteers?”

Well, not this kind (although he sure is cute!):

Smokey is the University of Tennessee’s mascot.  There’s a real one and a costumed one. 

“Are you going to talk about your military service?”

Nope, not that kind either. Although an essay about volunteerism in America would be nice…I won’t be writing it though.

But here’s a New Oxford Dictionary definition for you.

volunteer |?väl?n?tir|
noun
• a person who freely offers to take part in an enterprise or undertake a task.
• a person who works for an organization without being paid.
• a person who freely enrolls for military service rather than being conscripted, esp. a member of a force formed by voluntary enrollment and distinct from the regular army.
• a plant that has not been deliberately planted.
• Law: a person to whom a voluntary conveyance or deposition is made.

Today I’m going to discuss the 4th definition, the one related to plants.  This season I was overwhelmed with “volunteer” plants because of all the seeds that I let into my compost bin.  I have a nice household-sized compost bin that easily disassembles, so we can move around with it.  My composting ambitions are a bit frustrated from the moving around, since it takes about 2 years before I have a good enough batch to really impact my gardening.

Anyway, when I have a summer garden, I will “side dress” my plants with several handfuls of compost about every 6 weeks.  Often, that’s all the fertilizer my plants need, and all is well with the world.  Tomato seedlings will commonly pop up all over the place, and every few days I’d just pluck them out and pitch them right back into the compost bin.  No guilt.

This year, I had a lot of blank spots in my garden so I let some of the tomato plants persist starting in late August and I have some nice green fruits.

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

But this was a nice surprise — cantaloupe!  When this seedling came up back in August, I had no idea whether this would be watermelon, cantaloupe, pumpkin or cucumber.  Seeds from all those veggies were somewhere in the compost.  For fun, I decided to let it ride and see what happened.  I have counted SEVEN little melons on this vine.

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

I thought I’d share the fun before I cut down the volunteers, our first frost is due here any day now, and I also need to retreive the tomato and pepper cages before the movers come in 4 weeks.

Here’s are the other items I’ll be harvesting soon. I’m trying to milk this mild weather for as long as I can — lows around 40, highs in the mid-70s.

Peppers!

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

And WATERMELON! Four of them ready to harvest!

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
I think this one is about 8-10 lbs.!
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

Volunteerism

15. October 2010 · Comments Off on Volunteerism · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags:

Today I’m going to talk to you about “volunteers”.

“Oooo…what kind of volunteers?”

Well, not this kind (although he sure is cute!):

Smokey is the University of Tennessee’s mascot.  There’s a real one and a costumed one. 

“Are you going to talk about your military service?”

Nope, not that kind either. Although an essay about volunteerism in America would be nice…I won’t be writing it though.

But here’s a New Oxford Dictionary definition for you.

volunteer |?väl?n?tir|
noun
• a person who freely offers to take part in an enterprise or undertake a task.
• a person who works for an organization without being paid.
• a person who freely enrolls for military service rather than being conscripted, esp. a member of a force formed by voluntary enrollment and distinct from the regular army.
• a plant that has not been deliberately planted.
• Law: a person to whom a voluntary conveyance or deposition is made.

Today I’m going to discuss the 4th definition, the one related to plants.  This season I was overwhelmed with “volunteer” plants because of all the seeds that I let into my compost bin.  I have a nice household-sized compost bin that easily disassembles, so we can move around with it.  My composting ambitions are a bit frustrated from the moving around, since it takes about 2 years before I have a good enough batch to really impact my gardening.

Anyway, when I have a summer garden, I will “side dress” my plants with several handfuls of compost about every 6 weeks.  Often, that’s all the fertilizer my plants need, and all is well with the world.  Tomato seedlings will commonly pop up all over the place, and every few days I’d just pluck them out and pitch them right back into the compost bin.  No guilt.

This year, I had a lot of blank spots in my garden so I let some of the tomato plants persist starting in late August and I have some nice green fruits.

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

But this was a nice surprise — cantaloupe!  When this seedling came up back in August, I had no idea whether this would be watermelon, cantaloupe, pumpkin or cucumber.  Seeds from all those veggies were somewhere in the compost.  For fun, I decided to let it ride and see what happened.  I have counted SEVEN little melons on this vine.

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

I thought I’d share the fun before I cut down the volunteers, our first frost is due here any day now, and I also need to retreive the tomato and pepper cages before the movers come in 4 weeks.

Here’s are the other items I’ll be harvesting soon. I’m trying to milk this mild weather for as long as I can — lows around 40, highs in the mid-70s.

Peppers!

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

And WATERMELON! Four of them ready to harvest!

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
I think this one is about 8-10 lbs.!
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

Volunteerism

15. October 2010 · Comments Off on Volunteerism · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags:

Today I’m going to talk to you about “volunteers”.

“Oooo…what kind of volunteers?”

Well, not this kind (although he sure is cute!):

Smokey is the University of Tennessee’s mascot.  There’s a real one and a costumed one. 

“Are you going to talk about your military service?”

Nope, not that kind either. Although an essay about volunteerism in America would be nice…I won’t be writing it though.

But here’s a New Oxford Dictionary definition for you.

volunteer |?väl?n?tir|
noun
• a person who freely offers to take part in an enterprise or undertake a task.
• a person who works for an organization without being paid.
• a person who freely enrolls for military service rather than being conscripted, esp. a member of a force formed by voluntary enrollment and distinct from the regular army.
• a plant that has not been deliberately planted.
• Law: a person to whom a voluntary conveyance or deposition is made.

Today I’m going to discuss the 4th definition, the one related to plants.  This season I was overwhelmed with “volunteer” plants because of all the seeds that I let into my compost bin.  I have a nice household-sized compost bin that easily disassembles, so we can move around with it.  My composting ambitions are a bit frustrated from the moving around, since it takes about 2 years before I have a good enough batch to really impact my gardening.

Anyway, when I have a summer garden, I will “side dress” my plants with several handfuls of compost about every 6 weeks.  Often, that’s all the fertilizer my plants need, and all is well with the world.  Tomato seedlings will commonly pop up all over the place, and every few days I’d just pluck them out and pitch them right back into the compost bin.  No guilt.

This year, I had a lot of blank spots in my garden so I let some of the tomato plants persist starting in late August and I have some nice green fruits.

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

But this was a nice surprise — cantaloupe!  When this seedling came up back in August, I had no idea whether this would be watermelon, cantaloupe, pumpkin or cucumber.  Seeds from all those veggies were somewhere in the compost.  For fun, I decided to let it ride and see what happened.  I have counted SEVEN little melons on this vine.

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

I thought I’d share the fun before I cut down the volunteers, our first frost is due here any day now, and I also need to retreive the tomato and pepper cages before the movers come in 4 weeks.

Here’s are the other items I’ll be harvesting soon. I’m trying to milk this mild weather for as long as I can — lows around 40, highs in the mid-70s.

Peppers!

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

And WATERMELON! Four of them ready to harvest!

From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
I think this one is about 8-10 lbs.!
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers
From 2010 10 15 Garden Volunteers

3 Times in 26 Months!

14. October 2010 · Comments Off on 3 Times in 26 Months! · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , , ,
Okay, let’s all sing along (to the tune of Gene Autry’s “Back in the Saddle Again”):
I’m back in the O.R. again
Out under anesthesia, which I dread….
Where doctors take their knives
On what remains of my G.I.
Back in the O.R. again

I’m writing this corny little song from the surgery waiting room at University of Nebraska Medical Center near downtown Omaha.  Dave is in the middle of a basic hernia repair. This is a pretty common procedure, and for the most part I’m feeling pretty confident that everything’s going to be all right.

It’s worth discussing that there’s something about Nebraska that’s been driving Dave into the operating room every 13 months. First, there was his emergency appendectomy about 3 weeks after we moved here in August 2008. Then, in September 2009, Dave’s gall bladder removal. Which apparently I didn’t write much about, I was in a blogging drought in late 2009. Don’t know why.  I just looked at my blog posts from August/September 2009 and there wasn’t much at all.

Anyway, here we are, back again, for Dave’s 3rd surgery in 26 months. All of these procedures are pretty routine, and Dave recovers pretty nicely. You can’t even see his laproscopy scars from the first two procedures anymore. This one is an open procedure, so he’ll have a no-kidding incision on his lower abdomen, but that’s okay.

Dave’s health has been an absolute nightmare since we moved to Nebraska. We aren’t sure if it’s the air here, that our house is haunted, or the stresses of Dave’s job. Or just that his gastro-intestinal system was due to take a nosedive right about when we moved here. We don’t know for sure. It’s certainly frustrating, especially for a guy who didn’t really have any big medical issues right through age 30! The occasional twisted ankle, bout of the flu, etc.

We’re glad he’s getting this taken care of quickly, but it still takes away from the normalcy of our lives. But our life is anything but normal, right? Dave’s convalescent leave will take him right up to his trip to Florida to pick out a new house, then my Reserve 2 week tour in early November, and then we go right into the movers coming to pack up our house for our move!

We aren’t sure if we’ll be contracting with the “Big Orange Truck” company again for this upcoming move.  We’ll probably know this week.  They did a good enough job between NC and NE.
From 2008 07 10 Moving Pictures

In the meantime, I’m in “get ‘er done” mode at the house, wrapping up some projects so I can start preparing for the move. This is stuff I can do while Dave’s recovering at home. First off, finishing the boys’ Halloween costumes, then finishing up my HAP crochet projects so I can put away my sewing/knitting/crochet supplies with my other craft supplies. Then, I can get started on the garden: I have to disassemble our compost bin and dig up Dave’s hops. We plan to take rhizomes with us and get them in the ground as soon as we get to FL. I have to do it before Nebraska’s first hard freeze.

I’m dreading tackling the battery removal again.  Ugh…

So Far…So Good

11. October 2010 · Comments Off on So Far…So Good · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

I still need to fit the side buttons and hem the legs, but here’s the first set of overalls.

Nebraska Discoveries 20: Runza

07. October 2010 · Comments Off on Nebraska Discoveries 20: Runza · Categories: Uncategorized · Tags: , ,

Tonight for dinner, we went out.  It tends to be a necessity 1-2 times per week in the fall while the boys are in soccer 5-days per week (Jacob 3 days, Timmy 2).  I do what I can to cook but it’s rather aggressive; when I do cook I try to get the dinner on the table at 5:30pm, the boys have to be finished with dinner by about 5:50pm.

I asked the boys “Where would you like to go?”  We have several choices between our house and Jacob’s practice field.  I had suggested a family favorite, Jimmy John’s, but Jacob had a roast beef sandwich for lunch and said he didn’t want another one for dinner.  Since roast beef is the only kind of deli meat he eats.  Sigh…

We ended up at a local restaurant called “Runza”.  It’s a chain throughout Nebraska (the first one opening in Lincoln, NE in 1949), with a couple of additional stores in Iowa, Kansas and Colorado.  It’s quite good, a fun fast food alternative to your typical hamburger joint.  Definitely not the healthiest option, so we’ll go there 3-4 times per year.  Jacob LOVES Runza sandwiches!  The kids’ meal isn’t enough now, we get him an adult-sized combo meal!

Fortunately, they also sell hamburgers so Timmy doesn’t mind going either.

So…what’s so great about this Runza place?  Well, Runza restaurants feature these unique sandwiches: a seasoned blend of ground beef, onion and cabbage sealed in a special bread.  Cheese optional.

Today I made a cool “Nebraska Discovery“.  Runza is not only the name of this restaurant chain, but it’s also the name of the sandwich featured there.  It came to the Americas via “Volga German” immigrants.  If you do a Wikipedia search for “Runza”, you’re presented a choice: Do you want to learn about the sandwich itself, or the restaurant chain with the same name?

I’m not going to regurgitate what you guys could click on and read for yourselves regarding the history, but I thought it was pretty darned cool.

PS: Our local Runza puts a package of Silly Bandz-like bracelets in the Kids’ Meals! Whoo hoo!

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